I’m afraid I’m a terrible cook.
To save me time because I have to work, my to go menu was to prepare a stew with ground meat, mostly chicken, and potatoes, ‘cause they’re cheap and fill you up fast. Add water and pepper, cook, done. I try to cook big batches to save time.
A friend gave me a leek, so I added it to my usual mix: now I feel I’m fuller for longer and don’t have to eat that much meat (I usually mix the same amount of meat and potatoes).
Have I been coking wrong the whole time?
What else can I add to my stews to feel full for longer, to not gain weight but to have enough energy to do my job?
Any downsides to eating less meat?
A handful of barley, rice or oats is a nice addition at the end of a soup. Leafy greensike spinach all chopped up are good at the end too. You wanna stop cooking them when they look more green.
You want a variety of vegetables in your food. Carrots, celery, turnips and all kinds of onions will make the food taste better and nourish you longer.
Here’s how to make soup, broken up into steps that can be done on different days:
Step 1: cook off your chicken. Take cheap cuts like skin on bone in leg quarters and bake them until they’re almost done. In the us you can get big bag for ~.50 cents a pound. When they’re almost cooked, pull em out of the oven and put them in the fridge for later.
Step 2: make stock. Sometime later, debone and remove the skin from your cooked chicken. Save the bones and skin. Take all the vegetables you’re gonna put in the soup and prepare them completely, peeling and slicing onions, carrots etc and slicing ends off celery. Save all that stuff except for potato and turnip parts. Those can go in compost or trash.
It’s easiest if you have an electric pressure cooker like an instant pot for this, but you can do it longer on stovetop if you need. Boil all the vegetable stuff and chicken bones and skin for about an hour and a half in the instant pot or stovetop. If you use the pressure cooker you’ll have rich flavorful broth, if you do stovetop you may need to wait longer for it to get good.
Strain everything out and save the stock.
Step 3: make soup. Start with a roux by melting butter then adding an equal amount of flour and whisking it together. Let it cook while you keep it whisking till it’s as brown as you like and then add your vegetables for a few minutes then stock and chicken. Salt, pepper and herbs can be added at this point and once everything is cooked you can put the handful of grains and chopped up greens in.